Friday, June 29, 2012

How I Found Myself as a Mother...

There's a conversation that I think most SAHMs have had that goes a little something like this:

"So what do you do?"

"I'm a stay at home mom."

"Oh..."

Normally, this response is accompanied by an awkward silence, eyes quickly turn toward to the floor and all of the sudden you become uninteresting.

After having this experience many times, I started to become discouraged, feeling less than and lost sight of who I was as a mother.

That beautiful, on top of the world love feeling I had when I first had Miss E suddenly felt "unimportant" at that moment.

I found myself trying to find something to compensate for that unimportant feeling I felt being a mother.

I started a blog and crafted because it made me feel good and I guess I was hoping it would help me avoid that awful feeling. What I found out after trying to separate myself from the title: "stay at home mother" was what was most important. I realized that it wasn't that other women in the conversation trying to make me feel bad about being a mother, it was me.

As a mothers, we are constantly under attack from our society. There are plenty examples of this attack in our daily news. Society tries to make us feel less than, and unintelligent for choosing something that is in reality, such a pillar to our community and country. I don't know when motherhood switched from being a divine calling in our culture, to a burden and a "last resort" but it started to make me question if I was really making a difference being a mother.

And then something happened. Over the last several months, I did an experiment. I read an article that changed my thought process and the way society told me to view motherhood. Tears streamed down my cheek as I read and I knew that I wanted to be a better mother.

I started by tying to eliminate the things that were distracting me from being the mother I wanted to be.

Blogging has been such a wonderful outlet for me. I've loved documenting and sharing projects with you. But after reevaluating how my time was being spent, I realized a lot of it was dedicated to blogging. There is so much involved in the blogging process. Posts, pictures and editing, I discovered, was taking up precious time I could have been spending with little miss. So, I took a break.

While I was on my break, I said "yes" a lot more. I played play dough, baked cupcakes, went to the park, read stories, played Mr. Potato heads, put on a princess crown (everyday), danced, colored, participated in tea parties, I learned and sang all the songs in the "Tangled" soundtrack and made fun craft projects with my daughter.

What I noticed was: my daughter and I looked at each other differently. I really looked at her and noticed things I hadn't before. I noticed what she really wanted from me was my time. Our relationship began to change and I appreciated being a mother more each day. I would hear "I love you very much mommy" more times in the day than I ever had before. And as I learned to let go of all of my distractions, it became easier and easier. I actually enjoyed myself and my love for my daughter (which I didn't think could grow anymore) exponentially grew. I found myself as a mother and I am so grateful that this experience has given me that.

This doesn't mean I will never blog or craft again. In fact, I crafted quite a lot since I've been gone. What it means is that my first priority is E and everything else comes second, including the blog. Posting will probably be infrequent and I'm ok with that. I have my whole life to blog but only a few precious years while Miss E is little and I don't want to miss a thing. :)

Thank you for your concern, love and support. I have loved getting to know and build blogging friendships with you. :)

7 comments:

OH, boy do I love this post!!! I have had the "oh....well are you going back to work anytime soon" also, and it hurts at times, but we pick up our head and have faith that we are doing the Lord's "work". If feeling this kind of love and satisfaction is "work", bring it on! :) -not saying it's a cake walk, or every day is a miracle!-

I just LOVE LOVE LOVE your post Sierra ! Little Miss should always be PRIORITY #1. Family should be first and we never need to let society dictate where our priorities should be :) My Mom ( a grandma to all the kids/cousins now) was a SAHM until we went to Junior High School. Even though she went back in the corporate world, her family was always her top priority. Now that she is retired, her family is STILL her top priority but she has no time restraints and never misses out on any special moments. Enjoy ALL the special moments with Little Miss and GOD BLESS your family with great summer time fun and memories ! xoxox

Thank you so much for your post Sierra! I needed that. I love being a SAHM. I really do and I also feel that awkward moment when I tell people that I "just" stay at home. I think it makes it less awkward when I say, I love it, it's the best thing I can be doing right now. I grew up in a home where my mom worked 40-60 hours a week and I always envy people who had their mom home full time. Thanks for inspiring me to cut back on blogging :)

Love this post. I'm not sure how I missed it when you originally posted about this topic. Sometimes I feel like my need to have a clean house gets in my way. I feel like it is the only visible way you can tell I accomplished something. But I need to remember that while mosty of my "accomplishments" cannot be visibly seen now that they will have results in the future and my kiddos will love me all the more.

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Sierra is the author of The Blue Robin Cottage, mother of 3, lover of vintage things, Preschool teacher by day and crafter by night. She was recently published in The Huffington Post, Pop Sugar Moms, Haute Handbags and Romantic Homes. When she's not blogging, you can find her pulling all nighters at her sewing machine, creating vintage style dresses and dolls for her girls or for her Etsy shop: The Winking Apple.